What we learned from Atlanta (cont.)

2) The Steve Addington-Busch relationship is paying off ... even with those late-race restarts.

In the midst of all the madness, Busch wound up in Victory Lane. Successfully defending his win last spring, the No. 2 Dodge led 129 laps and was dominant during the race's final 100 miles. But it was outstanding restarts during the two green-white-checkers following the Keselowski mess that earned him the win. During the first one, he acted like he was shot out of a cannon in blowing by Clint Bowyer, Jamie McMurray, and Paul Menard to take the lead, all of whom risked older tires for the benefit of track position up front. Yet the second restart was even better, with Busch taking just two turns to dispose of Kenseth and break away to a runaway lead down the backstretch. Most observers thought the moves were clean ... although Montoya had his doubts.

"I'm not saying he doesn't deserve the win because he did," Montoya said, before claiming Busch jumped the gun, accelerating before NASCAR's mandated restart area. "[But] we have those two lines we are supposed to start with, and he went for it like 40 yards before the first one. It really surprised me. I just want to make sure for the next time NASCAR knows about it."

In the meantime, Busch's win speaks to how quickly Addington has become a leader within this team. After an ugly start to the season where all three Penske cars were 0-for-12 on top 5 finishes, it was Addington who took the lead in meetings this week to turn the program around.

"You see it back at the race shop," Busch recently said of Addington. "A lot of the guys have warmed up to him real easily."

Considering those guys didn't have a leader during last year's Chase -- ex-crew chief Pat Tryson was all but shut out of the shop after announcing a move to Michael Waltrip Racing -- reining them in was critical to get Busch off on the right track. Addington's done that, putting the No. 2 car in position to get on a roll with its short track strengths of Bristol and Martinsville ahead.

3) Hendrick is human after all.

After winning the last two races with Jimmie Johnson, Hendrick's seemingly invincible start to 2010 got ripped apart by faulty Goodyears. Over half-a-dozen tire issues combined plagued Johnson, Mark Martin, Jeff Gordon, and Dale Earnhardt, Jr., none of whom finished in the top 10 for the first Hendrick shutout since Watkins Glen in August. Those unscheduled stops dropped three of them off the lead lap at one point, with only Johnson getting lucky: his flat occurred right as an unrelated caution flag came out.

"It felt like the damn wheels were coming off," said Earnhardt, Jr., easily the most frustrated out of the group after he was the pole-sitter. "We pitted and the wheel was fine, but the car was vibrating so bad I couldn't hardly see."

Several other teams had issues, but Hendrick caught the worst of it, with some observers speculating they were experimenting with a new handling package designed for NASCAR's upcoming spoiler change. That's doubtful, and drivers' post-race comments concerning tires seemed to put that theory to bed.

"I think it's one of those things where when they come here and test, you expect them to build a tire that we can abuse and that we can race hard with," Gordon said. "That obviously wasn't the case. There is a good chance we were too aggressive, but until we go back and analyze everything it's hard to say."

Despite the problems, there's no reason to worry just yet: the quartet is fourth, seventh, 12th, and 13th overall, with Hendrick-supported Tony Stewart in eighth.

4) Toyota's got problems on the race track as well as off it.

The running joke in the Cup garage is someone's Camry is going to wreck on its own one day over a stuck throttle. But it's the manufacturer's engines stuck in neutral this season, failures haunting Michael Waltrip Racing in the form of four DNFs in four races combined for David Reutimann, Martin Truex, Jr., and satellite teammate Marcos Ambrose. The mystery mechanical woes have handicapped an otherwise solid program that's had all three cars capable of top 10 finishes each week.

But MWR's not the only program in trouble. Joe Gibbs Racing has seen superstars Kyle Busch and Hamlin crumble under the weight of poor luck and pit road problems, leaving them both without a top 10 finish this season. Things are so off-kilter, if the season ended today the lone Toyota Chase representative would be Red Bull's Scott Speed -- and he didn't even end last year in the top 35, let alone finish inside the top 10 at any unrestricted track on the circuit.

5) As March Madness begins, racing shows it has Cinderellas, too.

With Hendrick sidelined and Richard Childress Racing having a bad day (none of their cars finished higher than ninth), it gave other teams a chance to flex their muscle. Perhaps no one's happier than Richard Petty Motorsports, placing three cars in the top 10 for the first time since Infineon last June. You expect a solid run out of Kasey Kahne at this track (fourth), but Paul Menard? A fifth-place run gave the veteran his best ever finish at an unrestricted track in 115 career Cup starts. A.J. Allmendinger (sixth) rounded out the trio of Fords finally showing potential after a rocky start to 2010.

Further down the list, Regan Smith (14th) and Bill Elliott (16th) should be lauded for their efforts as underfunded single-car teams. And you have to give a call to Speed, whose 10th-place run gives him three top 20s in just four weeks -- one short of his total through all of last season (35 starts).

Ironic Moment of The Week: When Edwards wrecked Keselowski, guess who got NASCAR's "Lucky Dog"? Keselowski's biggest rival, Hamlin. How about that for poetic justice?

Race Grade: B. The middle part of Sunday's race had some moments that lulled you to sleep, but a finish filled with fireworks brought the crowd back to life. Only problem: the stands were filled at 65 percent capacity, which means this Atlanta race will also likely be its last in the Spring -- the track's expected to lose a date to Kentucky Speedway in 2011.

Email Tom at tbowles81@yahoo.com and follow him on Twitter at NASCARBowles